Kilowatt Heating, Air Conditioning and Electrical Blog: Posts Tagged ‘Electrical Wiring’

Aluminum Wiring in Your House: Do You Need It Rewired?

Monday, December 12th, 2022
home-electrical-wiring-types

Los Angeles may not have homes dating back to the 19th century like you often find in New England, but we do have homes old enough that may need extensive electrical rewiring. The amount of electricity a house uses daily has skyrocketed since the 1980s, and many homes have wiring that is older than that.

In this post, we’re going to address a specific type of older wiring issue, one that many homes in Los Angeles and the San Fernando Valley have: aluminum wiring. 

If you have aluminum wiring in your house, do you need to schedule rewiring to replace it? Follow us below to learn more… 

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Important Electrical Safety Advice for an Older Home

Monday, December 27th, 2021
cloth-wiring

Although most homes in Southern California would be considered “new” compared to those on the East Coast (where there are still many inhabited homes built at the beginning of the twentieth century), there are still a significant number that are more than 40 years old. That’s considered an older home when it comes to important home services, such as electrical safety. 

We’re older home specialists when it comes to electrical and HVAC needs, and we’ve helped many homeowners with the improvements they need for better, safer living in a vintage house. If you are living in a vintage home, you’ll find this list of safety advice a great help. We’re the electrician in Van Nuys, CA you can count on to meet all your electrical needs, from general to highly older-home specialized.

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Old, Outdated Wiring That May Be in Your House

Monday, October 18th, 2021
proper-electrical-panel-wiring

The oldest homes in Southern California are much younger than the oldest homes on the East Coast. That doesn’t mean we’re free of problems that come from older construction styles, outdated plumbing, and wiring that isn’t up to the standards of modern electrical loads and which may not be safe. At least we don’t have the troubles of knob-and-tube wiring, a frighteningly unsafe style of household wiring that electricians still find in homes in places like New England. 

If you live in a house that’s more than 40 years old—and you’ll still find plenty of those in Southern California—you may have outdated wiring. Call a Sherman Oaks, CA electrician to check on the electrical system to see if it needs updating. In fact, we recommend you call us, because we’re older home specialists: we understand how best to bring a vintage home into the 2020s. 

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We’re Older Home Specialists: Here’s What to Know About Rewiring an Older Home

Monday, July 26th, 2021

Although Southern California doesn’t have homes of the same age as you’ll find in, say, New England, there are many houses more than 50 years old here that families happily call home-sweet-home. Older homes can continue to be great places to live, but they have special requirements for their care. This is where having an older home specialist for HVAC and electrical needs is extremely helpful.

Not every electrician in Sherman Oaks, CA or serving Los Angeles and the San Fernando Valley specializes in older homes. We do. If your home was built pre-1970, you may have thought about its rewiring needs. We’ll go through several things you need to know about older home rewiring.

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Signs You Need Electrical Wiring Repairs

Monday, April 5th, 2021
home-electrical-wiring-types

Some home repairs you can delay for a while, but electrical wiring repairs are not one of them. When you have a warning of electrical issues with the wiring in the house, call for a licensed electrician to look into the problem and find a solution. Do not attempt to do a DIY inspection or repair: the safety hazards are simply too high, and it will cause your house to violate the local electrical code. Stay safe and have the job done right: call our electricians for the work.

To help you know when it’s time to call for a West Hollywood, CA electrician, we’ve put together a list of a few of the biggest warning signs of wiring problems in your house.

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Updating the Electrical System of a Vintage House

Monday, October 21st, 2019
usb-outlet

One of our specialties as an electrical contractor serving Los Angeles and the San Fernando Valley is working on older homes. Southern California may not be New England—we don’t have nineteenth-century homes here. But “vintage” doesn’t have to stretch back to the gaslight era. Many houses built before 1970 have specific requirements when it comes to electrical services (as well as HVAC services, which we also handle).

There’s no wrong time to arrange for Van Nuys, CA, electrical upgrades to your vintage home. But the best time to have a major electrical system overhaul is during a home renovation. You can make the wiring, outlets, panels, and more a part of an extensive renovation project. The results may not make a significant cosmetic change, but the difference in electrical performance and safety is massive. Expert electrical upgrades pay off for many years to come.

Below are important electrical upgrades and changes to have done as part of an extensive renovation.

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The Troubles With Aluminum Wiring in Your Home

Monday, October 7th, 2019
home-electrical-wiring-types

An important job of any electrician in Van Nuys, CA is keeping homes safe from fires due to faulty wiring. Bad wiring takes many different forms. Our electricians often run into terrible DIY jobs or amateur work on rewiring parts of a home that are against code. You may have this type of electrical danger in your house and not even know it because the previous resident was responsible.

There’s another wiring concern we often deal with: aluminum wiring. This metal was used extensively for wiring in houses built between 1965 and 1972. If you live in a home of this vintage—and there are plenty in L.A. and the San Fernando Valley—you may have a fire hazard lurking in your walls.

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I’ve Got Power Strips, Why Would I Need a Surge Protector?

Monday, September 24th, 2018

usb-outlet… or, to put it another way, “Aren’t power strips surge protectors?”

Yes, power strips offer some protection for precision appliances such as computers and HD televisions from damage in case of a voltage surge. We encourage people to use power strips rather than attempting to overload a circuit with an octopus plug, and any important electronic device should be plugged into a power strip.

But these power strips are not whole-house surge protection. They only serve as one layer against the expensive problems voltage surges can create. We recommend you arrange for whole-house surge protection installation with one of our licensed electricians.

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Cloth Wiring Hazards

Monday, September 10th, 2018

Cloth wiring is a common type of older electrical wire that was used in residential wiring.

If you have an older home, there may be an older version of wiring present which is much more dangerous than the new types of electrical wiring that are being used in homes today.

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Can I Do Any Electrical Wiring Work Myself?

Monday, July 16th, 2018

ceiling-fan-wiring-jobThis is a question homeowners often ask when they either have electrical wiring repairs that need to be done or when they’re contemplating a new installation, such as new lighting, a ceiling fan installation, or when wiring for an add-on room. It’s smart to look for places to save money in home improvement projects. But it’s much smarter to know when doing the work as a “do-it-yourself” project poses potential safety hazards.

There are a number of basic electrical jobs you can do on your own, such as changing a lightbulb and resetting tripped circuit breakers. But handling electrical wires? No, don’t try this on your own! And don’t allow anyone who isn’t licensed try it either, no matter what promises they make. When it comes to electrical wiring in a house, you want Brentwood, CA electricians who know the local electrical codes and are trained and experienced to do safe and effective wiring and wiring repair jobs.

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